Cindy King's International Business Blog » consistency

8 Simple Steps To Grow A Quality Twitter Following

Cindy King — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 23:00:08 +0000

Here is my article which was first published on Social Media Examiner:

Are you using Twitter and wondering whether it’s doing anything for your business?

Do you have a strategy? Or do you find yourself haphazardly tweeting at all hours of the day about everything from what you had for breakfast to news in your industry?

If so, you need a tweet plan.

What Is a Tweet Plan?

A tweet plan is a series of scheduled tweets used in conjunction with your real-time tweeting. The tweets in your tweet plan are carefully crafted to target your preferred audience. The result: Every day you consistently brand your Twitter presence and attract the attention of the people you want to reach, providing them useful information.

And because your tweets are evergreen, they can be scheduled in advance. This means you only spend a couple of hours writing and scheduling up to 4 weeks’ worth of tweets at a time. Here’s how it works:

Why You Should Use a Tweet Plan

There are three main advantages to a tweet plan.

A tweet plan brands your Twitter presence. Your audience immediately knows what you want to talk about, even when your Twitter discussions take you slightly off topic or you become busy with other things.

A tweet plan brings consistency. Even when your schedule gets busy, you will still share valuable information on Twitter.

A tweet plan saves time. You can write your tweets at your own convenience and schedule them to be tweeted up to 4 weeks later.

8 Steps to Creating Your Tweet Plan

Step 1: Choose Your Preferred Audience

Before you begin crafting your tweet plan, give some thought to whom you want to connect with on Twitter. There are many different types of people who could help your business. You will probably have best results if you choose just one or two. This is your preferred Twitter audience. Here are some suggestions:

Prospects: Find out more about what people want and connect with them early in your sales cycle
Clients: Find new customers ready to buy your product or service and provide customer support
Referral sources: Reach out to people who can help your business find more clients
Joint venture partners: Find other peers and research opportunities
Business network: Keep your business network alive and share ideas
Suppliers: Network to find suppliers and stay up-to-date with industry news

Step 2: Decide How Many Tweets You Want to Send Daily

Before writing your tweets, you need to decide how many timeless tweets you want to publish each day. You will base your decision on:

Your current Twitter presence and how many real-time tweets you usually send each day
Your audience and what they like. You are going to provide your preferred audience with content they want, so this is more a question of how much time they have for you

The important thing to remember is that your tweet plan only provides a backbone of tweets. It should not become your sole source of tweets on a regular basis.

Many people aim for a total number of about 20 tweets a day including both scheduled tweets and real-time tweets. In this case, a good number of timeless tweets to start with in your tweet plan would be 3 to 5.

Here’s an example. If you have 20 tweets a day on average and only 5 of these 20 tweets are from your tweet plan, you still have 15 tweets to engage with your followers and to respond to current news.

Important: The tweet plan’s main purpose is to get you on the radar of the people you are most interested in reaching. You still need to engage with your audience.

Don’t make the mistake of relying solely on the scheduled tweets in the tweet plan to connect with people and expect to build your business. You still need live tweets to engage with people. Live tweets help you to connect with people in a way that brings them beyond Twitter and leads them along the path you want to take with them.

Step 3: Decide How Long You Want to Make Your Tweet Plan

After deciding how many tweets you want to put in your tweet plan each day, you need to decide how many weeks you want to run your tweet plan and schedule tweets in advance. Again, this will depend on certain business factors and your audience. The two important considerations:

How much time you have
How quickly you can process the feedback you get from your audience to include in your next tweet plan

My preference: As a freelancer, I particularly like a 4-week tweet plan. This means once a month I spend an afternoon revising and scheduling my tweets. After 4 weeks, I have more insights and feedback that I’m eager to include in the next tweet plan to create a stronger connection with my market.

Step 4: Find the Keywords You Want to Use on Twitter

You use keywords in your tweets to send a consistent signal to tell others who you are, how you want to connect with them and what you want to talk about.

Choice of keywords. When choosing the keywords to use in your tweet plan, remember your preferred audience, the people you most want to connect with on Twitter. You want to use the keywords they use.

Number of keywords. The easiest way to write your tweet plan is to choose the number of keywords to correspond with the number of scheduled tweets you want to publish each day. So if you decide on 5 daily tweets in your tweet plan in Step 1, you should try to come up with 5 keywords.

This means your scheduled tweets will provide your preferred Twitter audience with useful information every day on each of these 5 keywords.

Suggestion: When choosing your keywords, keep Twitter’s 140 character limitation in mind. Use short words or word strings.

Step 5: Choose Different Formats for Your Scheduled Tweets

When you sit down to write your tweets for your tweet plan, you will need to write many in one sitting. Here’s the math:

5 timeless tweets a day x 7 days a week = 35 tweets a week

So, if you decide to plan 4 weeks of tweets, you will need to write 140 unique tweets.

35 tweets a week x 4-week tweet plan = 140 tweets

This is a large number of tweets. So you want to make the task easy. Using different formats helps you to do this. You will be able to write many timeless tweets on the same keywords when you use different formats.

Another good reason to use different formats when writing your timeless tweets is to add variety. You don’t want your Twitter feed to become boring.

My preference: I use 7 different formats and schedule one for each day of the week. I also increase the variety and experiment with results by changing the order in which these tweets are published each week. Here’s a snapshot from one of my tweet plans:

Step 6: Write Your Timeless Tweets

You want to write your tweets to provide your preferred audience with the information they are most interested in. Each tweet must be unique content because Twitter does not allow duplicate tweets.

This next step of writing a series of unique tweets is simple if, for each tweet, you:

Keep your preferred audience in mind
Use one of your keywords
Use one format to write your tweet

If you have chosen to use 7 different formats for your tweets, all you need to do is to write the number of weeks of tweets for each variation of keyword + format. For a 4-week tweet plan you will need something like this:

Tip: Use good Twitter practices when writing your tweets. Remember to include hashtags and limit your tweets to 120 characters to make it easy for others to retweet.

Step 7: Choose Your Times

You don’t want to publish all of your scheduled tweets at once. This does not look “natural” in your Twitter feed and you would only reach the audience online at that time. You want to spread your tweets out throughout the day. Ideally you will also be publishing the majority of your tweets in real time. By spreading out your scheduled tweets, they will appear in between the other tweets in your Twitter feed.

Tip: Make note of the hours you use for your different keywords in each tweet plan. This allows you to test the best times for your different keywords the next time you schedule your tweet Plan.

Step 8: Schedule Your Tweets

Now it’s time to schedule the publication of your tweets at the times you have chosen.

There are many tools available to do this. The two most popular ones are SocialOomph and Hootsuite.

Tip: Keep your list of tweets and refer to it along with the feedback you get from interactions with your preferred audience on Twitter to craft your next tweet plan.

Is a Tweet Plan for You?

Although a tweet plan is useful when your schedule gets busy, it’s not a way to avoid real-time tweeting. The tweet plan’s main advantage is to maintain brand awareness consistently and attract the people you want to meet on Twitter.

But there are different opinions about scheduling posts. Many people feel scheduling tools take away from the value of real-time interaction on Twitter. And they are right.

You must find a balance to make this work for your business. And you can only find this balance by jumping in, listening to your audience and tweaking the content you share on Twitter to get the best results.

What do you think? Would your business find value in using these scheduling tools strategically?

Need help creating your tweet plan? Click through to read more about what you need to do and how I can help you create your tweet plan.

Trust In Cross-Cultural Communication – Tip 20

Cindy King — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 23:00:27 +0000

Cross-Cultural Communication 30-Day Challenge – Build Trust

This is the last tip on being honest. We have dug through the topic of honesty and the perception of honesty in cross-cultural communication in some detail with these tips:

Be Honest

Now for the last tip on how to ensure that people from other cultures do not doubt your honesty, let’s look at the picture from a distance. And from this distance, the question is:

What do people from different cultures see?

So, the next question is the important one:

Is this whole picture one of an honest and trustworthy person or business?

This tip is of greater value in some cultures than in others. Although most cultures will notice inconsistencies, some cultures will look at the whole picture first.

Trust In Cross-Cultural Communication Challenge – Tip 20

Groom your reputation for consistency in all aspects of how you come across to others

Be Aware Of How Your International Clients See You

Your international clients see everything about you:

Your words, what you say, what you don’t say
Your gestures
Your attitudes
How you react with them, others and people in your company
What you do and how you do it

They usually absorb information about you that you would not imagine. The more cultural differences, the more they will notice what you do. And the question is:

What do they think of the whole picture?
Is there anything that does not fit or seem out of place?

When people from different cultures notice the different things about you they may also attach meanings. This of course leads to the next question of whether there is anything inappropriate.

It is important that the understanding or impression your international clients have of you remains consistent. A lack of consistency in a cross-cultural environment can lead to a perceived lack of honesty.

Strive For Consistency

As you become aware of the whole picture of how your international clients see you, you need to make sure this picture is consistent.

Are there any different cultural meanings in play?
Is there an important aspect that needs to be strengthened?

Adopt A Different Viewpoint

This process of grooming your reputation for consistency in how you come across to others is one of awareness.

To become aware of how your international clients see you, you need to change your viewpoint and try to see yourself as they do. As you become aware of how other cultures see you, you will be able to:

Look for ways to improve your communication
Have better control in avoiding wrong assumptions that effect how you are perceived

What about you?

Do you know how international clients perceive you and your business as a whole?
How do you find out how your international clients see you and your business?
Does your international business suffer from wrong assumptions made my your international clients?

Get All Cross-Cultural Communication Tips:

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Do You Use English Or American Spelling?

Cindy King — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 23:00:05 +0000

Culturally Customized Content

John Yunker on Global By Design wrote an article last month about different labels for different English spellings. Apparently the acronym “ENU” was used to mean “English – US”.

Another article raised the question of “International English” versus “American English”. I found this article slightly misleading simply because there are so many ways to use the term International English today: Global English, Universal English.

It does make me smile when an American says that “American English” is in the lead.

This reminds me of the all of trips to Canada, where Canadians would come up to me and say that Canada had been voted the best place to live in the whole world. After two different trips, I asked who carried out the study… well it was Canadian studies. The French go “coccoricco” often enough too.

There are quite a few interesting comments in this thread. I never thought the term “British English” could be considered false. And apparently Adobe uses:

“International English” (IE) = “American English”
“Universal English” (UE) = “British English”

Before you get into how you label your choice of English language, let’s look at how to choose the one you want to use.

There are in fact two business decisions to make.

Translations Or Not?

Are you writing for one broad international audience and would like to prepare the work for translating your content into different languages?

If you will need to translate your English language content into more than one language, you will save time and money by learning to write for an international audience.

If you strive for an International English you will also improve communication across a broader non-native English speaking audience.

Spelling

Are you targeting an American audience or a British, European or former British colony audience? This decision is fairly easy to make.

Although I was brought up with the Queen’s English, I have worked with American companies. I chose American spelling on my blogs because of software. I did not want to continually maintain the Queen’s English on American software. There is no major conflict for my business, so the decision was easy.

I still write in a style that is easy for non-native English readers. It is only a question of spelling and some grammar.

Clarity And Consistency

Whatever spelling you choose, remember to be consistent. This means that you should use the same spelling throughout all of your content, no matter who you are targeting. This makes your communication clear. Everyone knows how to identify you.

Do not create your own acronyms and keep your English labels simple and consistent with what your readers expect.

“EUS” does not mean anything to anyone
American English is not International English
British English is not Universal English

A Glossary For International Websites

Cindy King — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 23:00:41 +0000

How To Internationalize Your Website

One easy way to make your website easier for foreign readers is to offer a glossary.

A good glossary takes some time and effort. You need to make sure your glossary is as clear and concise as possible. You want to make your glossary easy to understand for all of your foreign visitors with a basic level of English.

What To Include In Your Glossary

Of course, the glossary’s function is to explain terms that your audience is not familiar with.

A glossary can be helpful within a company:

For new employees

Different departments within a company

Different workers on the same project

And this becomes crucial in a multinational company, with employees from different cultural backgrounds.

However, a glossary takes on additional functions for an international audience.

The key is to find out what your international audience may not be familiar with. You should also pay attention to processes that are different and where confusion may crop up.

Your international readers may also have questions that you may not be able to think of on your own. This is why it is a good idea to review your glossary with all of the questions you get from your foreign clients.

Even apparently simple terms can have slightly different cultural meanings in English. You never know which definition your non-native English speakers are familiar with. A simple explanation may be helpful.

A glossary can be extremely important for your international readers.

Many companies underestimate its value. When you are familiar with something, it is sometimes easy to forget how others may appreciate a little extra clarification.

How To Deliver Your Glossary

There are several ways you can publish your glossary.

Hard copy
Online help
Document to download
Web page

How you decide to deliver your glossary depends on the type of document and your industry.

Where you publish your glossary also depends on where it is most effective. Remember, a glossary builds clarity.

It is always best to deliver your glossary where and when your foreign readers will look for it and appreciate it most.

A Published Glossary

Most people think of the glossary you publish with your communication materials. This is its most common use.

A well thought out glossary can:

Dispel confusion
Be informative
Lead your readers to understand your message
Have a strong marketing appeal
Increase your credibility
Provide online link bait

A Translation Glossary

If you anticipate translations, you should also look at an additional role for your glossary. In today’s world of website localizations a translation glossary is a necessity.

Online companies are currently increasing the number of languages offered. Even if you do not anticipate translations in the foreseeable future, this might become part of your projects.

A translation glossary covers more words and terms. They are not published. They are only used by translators.

Translation glossaries ensure that you get accurate and consistent translations in multiple languages.

Important to note: Translation glossaries are very helpful to translators if you have them before website localization starts.

Do You Need A Glossary?

Most companies that actively sell to international clients will benefit for a glossary of some form.

You need to determine the format and where to deliver it for your best marketing value. And this will depend on:

Your website – domestic, international, country specific
Your industry jargon
Differences in your industry and foreign industry equivalents
Your international audience

Remember, to write a good glossary you need to work on it. It is not always as simple as copying something from a dictionary or Wikipedia. You also need to make it applicable to your business and your communication.

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Website Internationalization